Yeah, jokes aside (we had a previous discussion over mail on how a certain object in our current compo project should work where castlevania got mentioned a lot), i think it is unlikely we'd come up with something exactly like the castlevania classic mechanics, partly because the process would take us in directions, and partly because it ought to bring at least something new to the table and get an identity of its own. There's already a possible deviation in that mockup in the form of 8px platform elevation differences, for example. And that scene alone makes it impossible having bg based status bar. I'm just very keen on proving there's room for a game in the good old actionvania fashion.

Will look more closely at those rondo of blood stairs. The fact that you can jump on and off makes me believe there's two objects (cannot validate atm) or at least two cases within that object: the usual stairs and one that leads up/down through the floor between neighboring screens, because iirc you can't jump off stairs while moving through to the screen down under?

While this mockup contains two unique columns of distant background on each side of the tower, sideways scrolling can only show one side at a time. Which means the same two columns (instead of 4) could be used on both sides without the player realizing it unless actually studied.

For it to fake parallax it then needs to "scroll" ~10 unique tiles (times 8 prerendered scroll positions), and 2 more unique tiles times 2 , so 84 tiles, i think... which could actually fit inside the bg-chr page and still have a lot of tiles to spare with this set or something like it loaded in. That's the brute-force approach, at least.

Normally, a tower would scroll the other direction, but i think segmenting it like this somewhere could have some gameplay value, too. When/if vertical scrolling is needed, the screen would just omit the outside parts to keep things simple.

It took me a minute to realize there was a window on the left wall, and that's why there are lighting effects coming from that side. I'm not sure I would have noticed that in-game (I only notice because I'm looking at a static screenshot). I'm also not sure about the perspective with the two windows; I think it's just their placement, and the fact that the window on the right is the same height as the one on the left. It might help to make the one on the right shorter, as it's farther away. I do like the intent, though!

The quality of the drawing is incredible, but there is definitely something wrong with the left window's geometry.

To me it looks like it was purposely designed to try to force your brain to view the scene as a curved tower (back wall being concave) instead of a flat scene. The angle of that window is different from the other because the wall is a different angle at that point.

The quality of the drawing is incredible, but there is definitely something wrong with the left window's geometry.

To me it looks like it was purposely designed to try to force your brain to view the scene as a curved tower (back wall being concave) instead of a flat scene. The angle of that window is different from the other because the wall is a different angle at that point.

But then the ray of light should also have a different curve, which is not the case here. Also it would seem the wall is way more curved than what would be consistent with the border's position if the tower was cylindrical.

The tower was/is indeed meant to have a circular wall, but there wasn't much to support that intention. Here's some few changes i made today which i think conveys that better. Just some clean-ups to do, before i think i'm satisfied.

Yeah, in a realistic scene, rays of light would be cast differently from each window. I tried that first, but kinda failed, so i went with this more stylized/unrealistic setting. I might attempt it again, but there's a couple of problems:

-at this gritty grainy style of detail, rays in several directions would eat up the rest of the tilemap.-the alternative is coming up with simpler rays of light (another sort of stylization)-but even so, some angles just doesn't look that good at nes resolution.-which can be somewhat hidden with a bit of noise, in other words back to a grainy style.

So, that's the carousel of compromises i got a bit tired of eventually, and just went with diagonal lines as my base. Not saying it can't be done, of course... I'm just not sure it fits my preference.

Seems a very nice dungeon!Maybe you could add some skeletons, be it complete or in parts.If it really is a jail, of course.Maybe adding some sprites to create a smoke or fog effect on the animation would make the ambient even darker.Keep the good work!

The tower was/is indeed meant to have a circular wall, but there wasn't much to support that intention. Here's some few changes i made today which i think conveys that better. Just some clean-ups to do, before i think i'm satisfied.

Yeah, in a realistic scene, rays of light would be cast differently from each window. I tried that first, but kinda failed, so i went with this more stylized/unrealistic setting. I might attempt it again, but there's a couple of problems:

-at this gritty grainy style of detail, rays in several directions would eat up the rest of the tilemap.-the alternative is coming up with simpler rays of light (another sort of stylization)-but even so, some angles just doesn't look that good at nes resolution.-which can be somewhat hidden with a bit of noise, in other words back to a grainy style.

So, that's the carousel of compromises i got a bit tired of eventually, and just went with diagonal lines as my base. Not saying it can't be done, of course... I'm just not sure it fits my preference.

It is a very interesting scenario.

You could play with the background, creating clouds that pass slowly from left to right; and occasionally make a change palette to blue tones of light pass black and disappear, leaving just the white color outlining platforms.

Diskover: Thanks! "interesting" is one of my keywords for these scenes, so i'm happy that was the word you chose, deliberately or not. More explicitly, the goal i'm excercising towards is to tell something about the world in as many scenes as possible.

Fischer: You're on the right track. A prison is a likely side-use of a tower. I want the imagined player to ask "a prison - for what?". Note the unnatural size of those collars. That said, it's a detail that might be moved to some other scene in the end, who knows.

Right now i'm more or less free-form doodling pieces as a way to relax and focus, and stritching those together into a string of levels that make geographical and narrative sense would come later.

I'm kind of fantasizing every level would present a high level of uniqueness, but given the size of an average cartridge, it would be practical to reuse some of the settings at least a bit. I think this could serve both as a tower standing on the abutments of a bridge, and a part of the castle itself. A few palette changes should help.

Both: On sprite addons, i was thinking about maybe slowly animating the rays by moving diagonal lines slowly (in equally diagonal paths) back and forth in a sinoid cycle, if that description makes sense.

The tower was/is indeed meant to have a circular wall, but there wasn't much to support that intention. Here's some few changes i made today which i think conveys that better. Just some clean-ups to do, before i think i'm satisfied.

Yeah, in a realistic scene, rays of light would be cast differently from each window. I tried that first, but kinda failed, so i went with this more stylized/unrealistic setting. I might attempt it again, but there's a couple of problems:

-at this gritty grainy style of detail, rays in several directions would eat up the rest of the tilemap.-the alternative is coming up with simpler rays of light (another sort of stylization)-but even so, some angles just doesn't look that good at nes resolution.-which can be somewhat hidden with a bit of noise, in other words back to a grainy style.

So, that's the carousel of compromises i got a bit tired of eventually, and just went with diagonal lines as my base. Not saying it can't be done, of course... I'm just not sure it fits my preference.

I like it, but is that the darkest blue the NES has? I think the glowing light would look better with 2 shades of blue.

Maybe if you exchange the position of the left window (the one which is visible, not the one which is suggested) and the chain it would look better, because it really look like the left window is at 45° angle from the viewer, which is strange since it's just next to the central window which is parallel to the viewer.

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